Parking Should Be Easier At Airport

Work Crews Have Finished Installing New Signs That Help Clear Up The Confusion At Orlando International Airport.

November 25, 1998|By Lesley Clark of The Sentinel Staff

There are signs that finding your car at Orlando International Airport is getting easier.

Just in time for today, the busiest travel day of the year at the airport, work crews have finished installing dozens of new directional signs to help travelers figure out where they parked and how to reach the airport terminals without getting lost.

``We've checked and we've double-checked and there is much improved signage,'' said Michael Mannix, assistant executive director of the Greater Orlando Aviation Authority. ``We've had much fewer complaints in the last couple of days. We've even had a couple of positive remarks about people finding the signs helpful.''

Travelers on Tuesday had high marks for the signs, which were installed by a new company the aviation authority recently hired to solve the problems.

``It makes it pretty easy to figure out where you're going,'' said Tina Jackson, 38, an Altamonte Springs woman who parked at the B-side garage to pick up her daughter arriving from Boston. Jackson said she has gotten lost in the past at the airport. But she said she has a foolproof method: writing down her parking level and row before getting out of her car.

That didn't always help in recent weeks with the hurried re-marking of parking-garage levels and later the removal of some signs, which left travelers wandering in search of their cars.

The confusion was an outgrowth of a $115 million parking garage expansion, which seeks to give travelers more places to park. An additional 2,250 spaces are now available in the B-side parking garage. The construction of another 2,250 spaces in the A-side won't be completed until July.

New signs will be put up when both expansion projects are completed.

In the meantime, travelers now will find big ``You Are Here'' signs indicating which garage they are in (A-side, B-side or terminal top), as well as the level they are on. Signs in the elevators also now clearly indicate what levels visitors are on.

Officials expect the garage to be jammed today. Last Thanksgiving, 73,000 cars were parked at the airport from the Wednesday before the holiday to the Sunday after.

Today, Mannix said, ``is going to be the busiest day when it comes to parking. Sunday also is a busy travel day but many people are returning from vacation and going home, so parking won't be such a big hassle.

In preparation for the crowds, the authority plans to have additional employees staffing the garages to make sure travelers are reunited with their cars and to help travelers navigate their way to the terminals.

Another hassle has been resolved with the opening of all passenger tunnels from the garages to the terminals. Several tunnels were closed at various times recently because of construction, Mannix said.

In another attempt to avoid confusion, the airport has whimsical sculptures of animals in glass bays near the parking-garage elevators. The cartoonish animals, aimed at jogging people's memories in terms of what floor they parked on, correspond to cartoon figures on the elevator buttons.

Parking in the garages already was tight Tuesday. Jackson said she waited 10 minutes for a family to pack its car with luggage, only to lose the spot to another vehicle.

``The parking?'' she asked. ``There isn't any.''

That's why airport officials are urging travelers - especially those embarking on long trips - to use the satellite parking lots, formerly called park-and-ride lots.

Shuttle buses carry travelers from these lots to the terminal curb. The parking rate in the satellite lots is $4 a day, compared with $10 a day in the garages.

``If you're gone for more than a couple of days, we encourage the satellite parking,'' Mannix said. ``It leaves space available at the terminal for people who are doing the meet and greet, picking someone up at the airport.''

The ``gold'' and ``red'' satellite lots were open Tuesday. The ``blue'' lot will be opened only if needed.